Auto Success Magazine Feature Article, January 2012

 

Auto Success Magazine

January 2012 by Drake Baerresen

                                               FREE UP YOUR SALES STAFF

This year’s growth has left many dealerships with fewer trained and able people on staff than needed to adequately work customers and leads. With business returning to showrooms and leads to inboxes across the country, opportunities are being missed, and car deals are moving up the street. Customers are moving on and buying from other dealerships because there is no one there to respond their inquiries in a timely fashion. There is no question that there are plenty of people looking for jobs who have the skill sets required to fill these positions. If you are facing these issues or see them coming around the corner, now is the time to start grabbing your share of the talent made available by this recession. The only problem is the time it takes to find them and, once found and hired, to train them to work with your customers. Technology is now allowing dealerships to fill this gap and right size their Internet sales departments immediately. Dealerships can more than double the efficiency of each person using artificial intelligence. This means you will not need to overstaff during times of growth to be sure your customer experience remains consistent.

Since the beginning of the Internet, lead people have used template-driven auto responders. At first, they included the customer’s name and a few other fields to look somewhat personal. Next came stock images of the vehicle the customer was looking for and other dealership information. These canned messages no longer work. The last 12 months have seen this technology move forward light years. Today’s artificial intelligence is virtually indistinguishable from a real person. Now when Internet leads arrive, they can be engaged immediately with relevant information. Not only can it be presented, it can also be collected. Customers have a two-way interaction with what they believe to be a real person up the point where they are ready to visit or call the dealership. At this time, a person is notified with not only the appointment but all the relevant and personal information collected from the customer during the automated exchange — for instance, that they need an SUV so that mom and take her daughters to dance and still fit her son’s hockey equipment in the back. This seamless transition helps convert more leads to deliveries. Now your people can spend more of their time face-to-face or on the phone with customers.

By utilizing artificial intelligence, you can be sure that your dealership is prepared to handle increased lead volumes. Now your customers will not suffer every time someone is sick for a few days or leaves the dealership. With today’s technology, each person you have will be able to handle more than double the leads and handle them better than ever before. With greater appointment and show ratios, more sales are inevitable. Your people will save their passion and enthusiasm for those people that are ready to talk on the phone and visit the dealerships. The best way to increase sales is to keep your salespeople selling. For a free copy of, “How technology can improve my sales,” e-mail me at the address below.

Drake Baerresen is the vice-president of sales and marketing at TurnKey Events. He can be contacted at 866.476.7748, or by e-mail at drakeb@tkevents.com.